Leland came down hard on the heel of his left foot.
The floodlight, which was controlled by a motion sensor, didn’t ignite. The dark night air of 11:45 was dimly lit by the full October moon, but it was still dark enough Leland didn’t notice that stone.
He let out a quiet yelp, coming down hard on a stone just off the steps of his river home. Leland ran out of the front door at this late hour, wearing only his boxer briefs. Lucie-gal, his Anatolian Shephard, stood at the southernmost corner of his property and barked wildly into the darkness across the river. He feared his nearby neighbor just upstream would eventually lose patience with Lucie-gal and send a caravan of 12-gauge bird-shot pellets in her general direction.
He couldn’t have that.
The world was already unraveling with tenacious speed. The last thing Leland needed was an upset neighbor on the river. And a dead dog.
The unthinkable finally happened. Not since 50 years earlier during the Cuban Missile Crisis had the world faced the terrible threat of nuclear war. But the threats arrived, a war that could lead to the mutual destruction of all parties involved and the entire world itself. Like a hurricane tumbling over itself once it makes landfall, breaking into chunks of thunderstorms and tornadoes, the bombs were dropping clumsily over targets throughout the Western world. And, of course, all over Russia. Thousands of years of protected architectural marvels were disintegrated in mere seconds, along with the millions of people unprotected as their shadows evaporated. The warmongers and elite madmen who controlled and contorted the levers of the world finally got their way.
Negotiations between Ukraine and Russia never really happened. The United States, Germany, the United Kingdom, and NATO countries in general, made sure of that. The provocations and calamitous proxy miscalculations and dull-headed bluffs finally led to all out nuclear war. Both sides blamed the other for the first missile launch, but things happened so fast and the media had lied about all manner of issues so effectively over the past few years that it was hard to know what — or who — to believe.
Leland knew one thing: He had to get out of Jacksonville and get to his river camp in the deep woods of the Florida Panhandle as soon as possible.
He first worried the military bases in those areas would be targeted, but it was now clear, if they were targets, it wasn’t imminent. It was rumored the military bases cleared out, the soldiers and equipment commissioned to desert outposts, other places with strategic interests. One could probably loot the bases and get away with it, if there was still any gas to get to and from them.
New York, Los Angeles, Washington, D.C., those were the kinds of targets of the first attacks. Where they would go from there was anyone’s guess, but the river camp Leland’s father left him seemed like a sure bet as a buffer of safety.
Back in Jacksonville, Leland used what bit of stale gas he had left in his workshop to fill up his Toyota SUV. He siphoned a couple gallons from his mowers for a reserve tank. He then loaded the dog, his weapons, a large bin of non-perishables, beef jerky, things he had preserved over the years, a big, metal bin of seeds he had saved, and of course, all the ammo he could find. He packed a few clothes, his pillow and some blankets. He even put three laying hens and two rabbits in a small pin. Along the ride, the chickens cackled with every bump. It was a small start, but if the world was starting over, he would have to get back to his roots, get those chickens to lay eggs, breed those rabbits and eat their offspring. Perhaps, once established, he could even barter with nearby neighbors.
These thoughts were surreal to Leland. But he had to snap out of the haze and take seriously the prospects of a very different future. He was raised a country boy, but left home after high school. After college, he moved to Jacksonville against his father’s wishes. He became a defense attorney there and for the next 10 years asked himself “why” when he stared in the mirror. He never married, never had kids. By the time he made it into his mid-30s he often felt sorry for himself for not hitching his wagon to someone, starting a family. Now, he just felt sorry for those who had people to care for, to protect. He had a dog, three chickens and two rabbits. It was a lonely but small type of relief that made him sigh at the thought of his unhinged life. Any morsels of selfishness were brushed away like crumbs on his shirt.
It was a dangerous thing hitting the open road at a time like this, but Leland knew it had to be done. He had old paper maps stuffed in the side door bin of his truck, detailing every backroad from Tallahassee to his river camp in the Panhandle. The Internet still worked but was spotty, and with conspiracy wheels turning, he wouldn’t use his GPS to get from A to B.
He could charge his phone in the Toyota, but wondered if there would be any working electricity along the river. He also worried what he would find when he eventually pulled into the driveway. He kept his .9 millimeter in his lap. Lucie-gal road shotgun and was a fluffy but formidable character. She panted and occasionally stumbled onto the center console to give Leland a slobbery lick on the cheek. He acted in disapproval but really loved the random affections of his gal.
The trip from the big city to the river camp would normally take about six hours during normal times. That was six hours heading west on Interstate 10, wide open nearly the entire way. This trip, under darkness of night and all manner of potential threats, would be very different, he thought. Leaving Jacksonville, he took a few dirt roads, perhaps being overly cautious. He knew these roads well, because despite being an asshole defense attorney he still liked to fish and hunt; over the years he developed a useful skill of foraging wild things from the woods. He made wine and jellies from wild persimmons and crabapples. Wild grapes were aplenty. He didn’t mind dandelion salads and he preferred Florida betony over radishes. He recognized wild edible yams and knew which ones to avoid. He knew the difference between the edible mushrooms called chanterelles and the poisonous Omphalotus oleariusso, also known as “Jack-O-Lanterns,” the latter having true gills rather than folds. Those would get you in trouble in a hurry. This hobby would prove to be a useful skill.
Leland was also an excellent marksman. Every weekend, his singleness exposed itself, allowing him to spend time on the range with all manner of caliber and arsenal. He wasn’t a war vet, but killed plenty of wild game and was skilled with weapons of all types. This would prove to work in his favor.
His trip started in the late afternoon. Leaving town, meandering through neighborhoods, proved to be a surprising spectacle. He envisioned and was prepared for all-out war with people he would normally greet with an amenable smile and hold open a door when entering the hardware store. What he found instead was a very different scene indeed. People sat in their front yards in lawn chairs, grills blowing, smoke billowing and the scents of charcoal, cooking meats and beer wafting through the air. The scene was similar to block parties preparing for the sun to set, waiting for the Fourth of July fireworks to begin. Had American life really become such a cartoonish spectacle? Was this the foolish doppelganger of a former generation forged in steely resolve? Were the masses in their Potemkin carbon cutout homes really entertained by the possible end of the world? Had their resolve sank this low? Whatever the case, Leland breathed a sigh of relief. However, he didn’t expect every town between Jacksonville and the river camp to act as foolish. Some would be prepared. And so would he.
Come you masters of war
You that build all the guns
You that build the death planes
You that build the big bombs
You that hide behind walls
You that hide behind desks
I just want you to know
I can see through your masks
You that never done nothin’
But build to destroy
You play with my world
Like it’s your little toy
You put a gun in my hand
And you hide from my eyes
And you turn and run farther
When the fast bullets fly
Like Judas of old
You lie and deceive
A world war can be won
You want me to believe
But I see through your eyes
And I see through your brain
Like I see through the water
That runs down my drain
You fasten the triggers
For the others to fire
Then you set back and watch
When the death count gets higher
You hide in your mansion
As young people’s blood
Flows out of their bodies
And is buried in the mud
You’ve thrown the worst fear
That can ever be hurled
Fear to bring children
Into the world
For threatening my baby
Unborn and unnamed
You ain’t worth the blood
That runs in your veins
How much do I know
To talk out of turn
You might say that I’m young
You might say I’m unlearned
But there’s one thing I know
Though I’m younger than you
Even Jesus would never
Forgive what you do
Let me ask you one question
Is your money that good
Will it buy you forgiveness
Do you think that it could
I think you will find
When your death takes its toll
All the money you made
Will never buy back your soul
And I hope that you die
And your death’ll come soon
I will follow your casket
In the pale afternoon
And I’ll watch while you’re lowered
Down to your deathbed
And I’ll stand o’er your grave
’Til I’m sure that you’re dead
— Bob Dylan, Masters of War
Taking backroads, Leland meandered through the southernmost parts of Georgia, then dipped back down into the upper regions of rural north Florida. It was easy to stay off the beaten path but hard to know if the direction he was going was actually right. He knew it was partly right but feared it was mostly wrong, burning too much of the precious gasoline in his tank, forcing him to dip into reserves. Life in the rural deep South seemed to go on as normal. Small farmland lay either uninhabited, derelict or in meager straights. Farmers had a tough go at life in this age, even before the bombs started falling. The same kinds of people who were destroying the planet by nuclear detonation were also in charge of the national food and drug administrations as well as the agricultural departments. They decided long ago that if you wanted to farm for a living you either had to get big — which meant sucking on the government teat — or get bent.
People like these bureaucrats were busy destroying the world. Why was it so hard to believe they weren’t working for years to unravel local food supplies, create so much red tape and financial overhead that a regular man couldn’t make a living owing a local abattoir? This was the new song of the south. Poverty. Dependence. Disgrace.
Leland raced down the 185, cutting through a maze of narrow dusty roads, passing Altman’s Grocery, which was once a staple in the community but now sat abandoned. He stopped briefly, rifle in hand, to see if the store had anything of value. He figured, if it was abandoned, the owners were no longer alive or no longer around to defend themselves. He had a wad of cash in his pocket and was willing to give it to anyone who was willing to exchange, but he was pretty sure cash was as worthless as the paper it was printed on.
With his gun ready, he tentatively checked through the store, but it had been picked over. This was an old-school local mercantile store. They had a deep chest cooler up front that was normally filled with cold cokes, the classic glass bottles he remembered as a kid. The ones that still required a bottle opener. It was empty and smelly and lukewarm.
The floors, old as Moses, creaked. There were gaps in the decking and the unknown mysterious life below in the crawlspace probably remained active despite the absence of life in the store. Perhaps there were even people hiding down there. There would have been pallets of deer corn for the local hunters. There was an entire section labeled “Food plot mix,” and another end cap with a sign for garden seeds and bags of cover crops. It was all gone. One corner had a small cooking area where an old lady once dangled spent cigarettes from her mouth while making the best greasy burgers in the area, all on a flat-iron skillet. At least the general level of the locals’ cholesterol would most likely improve with the loss of this jewel of a corner store. Leland couldn’t even find a bag of rice or a pack of disposable razers. Discouraged and not wanting to linger too long, he left.
Lucie-gal sniffed the base of a fern-covered pecan tree. She peed at its base and sniffed some more. The screen door of the store slapped as Leland exited, his boots clacking on the old wooden planks of the big front porch. He called Lucie-gal to come on. She listened and ran toward him, desperately avoiding separation from her master.
Leland left the store, drove a few miles, then darted off through the splintered, unkempt roads of the Osceola National Forest, all the while racing while holding the wrinkled weathered map in one hand and guiding his vessel through the forest roads.
The forest workers no longer cleared the broken pines that hung crippled over the road. Just prior to the eruption of nuclear war overseas, a late season hurricane ripped through the region, felling many pines, snapping them off in uniform directions about 12 feet off the ground. The forest looked like God mowed everything down with a weed-eater as big as a skyscraper. Leland often had to drop his rig into the lower gears of four-wheel-drive. The chickens cackled and squawked. Lucie-gal hung on for dear life. The window was usually rolled down, which she normally loved. She’d hang herself out, tongue flapping and gaily lapping up the breeze. In this case, she tried to make herself as small as possible, kneading down into the floorboard like a batch of unrisen dough, flat in the bottom of a bowl. She looked at her daddy with the saddest eyes in the world. He tried to avoid her gaze but he felt it all over him.
“I know, baby, this won’t last long,” he said.
Leland would hit a deep bump, “I’m sorry, darlin’.” He hated the stress this stretch of road put on Lucie-gal, as well as the chickens and rabbits. He knew he would have a mess to clean up in the back of the 4X4.
Rabbits rarely make any noise, and when they do, you dream of earplugs. When they do screech, it is ear piercing. But Leland’s rabbits dealt with the abuse with a resigned submission, a vow of silence, occasionally oscillating in circles around the chickens since they were all trapped in the same small pen. If the chickens were the gossiping choir ladies, the rabbits were the monks of the pen.
For a short spell, Leland did catch up on some time, racing down Interstate 10, until hitting U.S. 90 near Greenville. It was a short but blessed release from the badgered roadways when he was off the beaten path. He worried about roadblocks and nefarious characters, but through this stretch there were none.
He was close to Monticello. He had a cousin there and wondered if he could count on visiting her to stop for the night. Would she still be home? Was the home he remembered and had marked on his map still her home? Is she even alive?
Many dreadful thoughts arose. It had been years since they spoke and it was unfortunately through an online post where there were a few “likes” and an even fewer number of shallow comments. So in reality, they hadn’t spoken in more than 15 years, and that was at their grandmother’s funeral, where no one seemed to know each other or to know what to say.
Would she even recognize him? He didn’t even know if she was married or had a family. It bruised his soul to think of how the concept of family and relationships had been so tarnished over the last decade amid the shallow dependence of online social media outlets — the very places that betrayed and silenced those who were so desperately trying to raise the alarm bells of nuclear war. She could shoot him in the chest before he ever made it onto her front porch and she might not even recognize him as he lay there bleeding out from the wound, gasping to call out her name.
For a moment, he reconsidered. Was this too much of a risk? He even looked at his map to observe an alternate route. But there was no turning back. Almost all of his family was gone at this point so he felt he owed it to her to check in. He checked the map to verify the address.
He took old roads toward the town. No resistance. The breeze was cooling as he entered into town. On the horizon was a smog of dirty brown, gray and orange colored clouds hanging over the town. As he drove closer to his cousin’s house on High Street, he noticed fires burning, but the town seemed vacant of people. One house after another was burning, fires quenching the olden pine plank structures, turning them bitterly into charcoal and steaming piles of ash.
Like so many of the homes in Monticello, the one where his cousin supposedly lived was burned out and smoldering. This was a very different scene from the one he experienced when escaping Jacksonville.
While leaving High Street, a roadblock awaited. A gaggle of misshapen vagrant looking characters stood behind what was once state-owned roadblock barriers. Some had shotguns and some held pistols, thugs, looking for their award in marksmanship.
Leland was an excellent marksman.
To be continued…